BOSTON, Massachusetts, USA — Friday, October 8th, 2010 — The Free
Software Foundation (FSF) today issued a warning to consumers over
Microsoft’s upcoming Windows 7 Phone Series. The software release is
backed by a reported 400 to 500 million dollar marketing campaign that
aims to distract consumers from its history of abusive behavior, and
recent actions as a patent troll: attacking free software based phones
like Android.

FSF is advising citizens to help increase awareness for the threat that
Microsoft posses to computer user freedom, providing details at:

“Software patents are the most important anticompetitive,
anti-software-developer tool available. And right now they are being used
by Microsoft in an attempt to crush computer users’ freedom. Proprietary
software like Windows 7 Phone are designed to keep users divided and
powerless and must be rejected” said Peter Brown, FSF executive director.

“Windows 7 Phone Series is another cookie-cutter example of Microsoft’s
bumbling maliciousness to everything it does.”, said Matt Lee, FSF
campaigns manager, “Microsoft’s damaging approach to software freedom,
coupled with their utter contempt for customers and developers alike, has
produced yet-another-platform of systematic control. This is a platform
designed only to appease its shareholders and help the folks at the MPAAs
and RIAAs of the world feel better about the chaos they seek to foster
surrounding digital restrictions and other technical folly imposed on
computer users.”

About the Free Software Foundation

The Free Software Foundation, founded in 1985, is dedicated to promoting
computer users’ right to use, study, copy, modify, and redistribute
computer programs. The FSF promotes the development and use of free (as in
freedom) software — particularly the GNU operating system and its
GNU/Linux variants — and free documentation for free software. The FSF
also helps to spread awareness of the ethical and political issues of
freedom in the use of software, and its Web sites, located at fsf.org and
gnu.org, are an important source of information about GNU/Linux. Donations
to support the FSF’s work can be made at http://donate.fsf.org. Its
headquarters are in Boston, MA, USA.

About Free Software and Open Source

The free software movement’s goal is freedom for computer users. Some,
especially corporations, advocate a different viewpoint, known as “open
source,” which cites only practical goals such as making software powerful
and reliable, focuses on development models, and avoids discussion of
ethics and freedom. These two viewpoints are different at the deepest
level. For more explanation, see
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html.